After a Year Online, He Transferred Me to a Stranger

Chloe Bennett spent a year losing weight to meet Tyler Hayes, her online boyfriend. The day before they were supposed to meet, she found his post giving her away: he called her a two-hundred-pound fat girl, hated fat chicks, and offered her to anyone interested. The post was three months old. That was when Tyler had suddenly turned cold and tried to break up with her. She begged him to stay, bought him sneakers, and he switched accounts.

Tyler was the football team captain, rich, and everyone kissed up to him. His teammate sent Bella a screenshot: Tyler passed Chloe off to someone else, and he had a new target, Madison Lee, the campus beauty. In the group chat, Tyler was all about looks, and if anyone was to blame, it was her for being ugly. Chloe had been heavy her whole life, mocked and called a pig. Her parents told her she was cute, but that cute was why she was bullied.

She met Tyler online in a game. He liked her voice, comforted her, and confessed. She hid her weight, terrified he would find out. When he wanted to meet and get into the same college, she decided to lose weight. She went from almost two hundred pounds to one hundred and ten, learned skincare, makeup, hair, and fashion. She applied to his college. They were supposed to meet when school started.

But Tyler had already moved on to Madison. Chloe joined the freshman group chat under her real name, and Madison invited her to the freshman dinner, wanting to watch the fat version of her get humiliated. Chloe's online boyfriend—the account buyer—had been sending her gifts and asked for her picture. She sent him a real one and offered to break up if he couldn't handle it. He called her cute. She thought he was using Nathan Cole's photo. At the airport, she met him: it was Nathan Cole, the legendary quarterback, gentle and sincere. He drove her to the freshman dinner.

At the dinner, Madison and Tyler were already mocking the fat girl who was about to show up. A heavy-set girl walked into the private room, and they started in on her. She was the server. Then Chloe walked in. "Hi, I'm Chloe Bennett." The room went silent. Tyler never saw it coming. Nathan was the boy she once snuck cookies with at weight-loss camp, and he had loved her exactly as she was. Tyler discovered the truth far too late: Chloe had already chosen the one who loved her all along.